The historical cultivation of common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) has resulted in the development of local populations/cultivars in restricted Italian rural areas. Many common bean landraces, still cultivated in small mountain areas from Sicily, have become outdated and endangered due to the commercial varieties spreading. These accessions are poorly known but often represent a genetic heritage to be preserved and enhanced. The ex situ conservation of fifty-seven Sicilian common bean landraces was carried out at the “Living Plants Germplasm Bank” at Ucria (Messina, Italy), founded by the Nebrodi Regional Park, together with the “Sicilian Plant Germplasm Repository” of University of Palermo (SPGR/PA). To assess the germplasm genetic diversity, nineteen morphological traits and eight Simple Sequence Repeats (SSRs) were used. Genetic distances among landraces were calculated to construct a clustering tree by using unweighted pair group method arithmetic (UPGMA). Seed germplasm diversity of Sicilian common bean varied from 80.7% to 93.3%, based on six seed descriptors and six leaf, flower, and pod descriptors, respectively, while cluster genetic analysis depicted a clear separation among all the 57 landraces. Principal coordinates (PCoA) and STRUCTURE analyses showed a prevalent rate of admixture between Mesoamerican and Andean gene pools in Sicilian common bean collection, confirming its heterogeneity. The observed high level of diversity evidenced the needs to adopt accurate criterion to plan a definitive ex situ germplasm collection to share agrobiodiversity with local farmers and to avoid any further loss of genetic resources in rural and protected areas.

中文翻译：

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保护边缘农村地区的生物多样性：西西里菜豆种质收藏的形态和遗传变异性评估。

普通豆（ Phaseolus vulgaris L.）的历史种植导致了意大利受限农村地区当地种群/品种的发展。许多常见的豆类地方品种，仍然在西西里岛的小山区种植，由于商业品种的传播，已经过时并濒临灭绝。这些品种鲜为人知，但往往代表着需要保存和增强的遗传遗产。内布罗迪地区公园与意大利大学“西西里植物种质库”共同建立的乌克里亚（意大利墨西拿）“活植物种质库”对 57 个西西里菜豆地方品种进行了迁地保护。巴勒莫（SPGR/PA）。为了评估种质遗传多样性，使用了十九个形态性状和八个简单序列重复（SSR）。采用非加权配对组法算法（UPGMA）计算地方品种间的遗传距离，构建聚类树。西西里菜豆的种子种质多样性从 80.7% 变化到 93.3%，分别基于 6 个种子描述符和 6 个叶、花和豆荚描述符，而聚类遗传分析显示所有 57 个地方品种之间存在明显的分离。主坐标（PCoA）和结构分析显示，西西里菜豆收藏中中美洲和安第斯基因库之间存在普遍的混合率，证实了其异质性。观察到的高水平多样性证明需要采用准确的标准来规划明确的异地种质收集，以便与当地农民分享农业生物多样性，并避免农村和保护区遗传资源的进一步损失。